Wheat Kings earn third WHL crown

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This article was published 14/05/2016 (3679 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

KENT, Wash. — Twenty years after their last Western Hockey League title, the Brandon Wheat Kings are once again champions.

The Wheat Kings beat the Seattle Thunderbirds 8-4 in Game 5 of the WHL final on Friday at the ShoWare Center, winning the best-of-seven series 4-1.

It’s the third time that Brandon has won a league title, and all three came on American ice, with the 1978-79 championship won in Portland, Ore., and the 1995-96 trophy in Spokane, Wash.

Wheat Kings head coach and general manager Kelly McCrimmon said he was proud of everyone in the organization.

“It’s a great accomplishment for the whole organization, for our fans, for our players” McCrimmon said. “We’re happy for those people who work so hard and care so much, the people in our office, it’s really gratifying to win.”

The winning goal came off the stick of playoff most valuable player Nolan Patrick in the third period but it was Jayce Hawryluk’s hat trick that did the damage.

Brandon opened the scoring 3:15 into the first period on a pretty three-way passing play that started with Tim McGauley chipping the puck to Reid Duke, who sent it over to John Quenneville. The Edmonton product quickly rifled it by Thunderbirds netminder Landon Bow for his league-leading 16th of the playoffs in 21 games.

He had 31 in 57 regular-season games.

Seattle’s fourth line tied it five minutes later when Brandon Schuldhaus stripped the puck from a Brandon defender and sent it over to Josh Uhrich, who fired it by Brandon starter Jordan Papirny.

Macoy Erkamps restored the lead with a power-play blast 14:18 into the first.

Tyler Coulter put his team up 3-1 early in the second after Papirny made a sensational save to keep his team ahead. However, the momentum quickly took a hard shift back in Seattle’s favour.

Uhrich scored his second just over a minute later, and when Erkamps took a slashing penalty eight seconds later, Seattle captain Jerret Smith tied it on the power play with his first of the post-season.

The Thunderbirds took their first lead 12:38 into the period when Alexander True sent a laser from the slot over Papirny’s shoulder with the teams playing four aside.

McGauley tied the game when he dangled by a Seattle defender and sent a pass over to Hawryluk, who popped it into the open net.

“We just stuck with it there tonight,” McGauley said. “It wasn’t a blowout game. We were up 3-1 and they came back and battled hard to make it 4-3. We had to keep going. They worked hard all game long and didn’t give up.”

Patrick gave Brandon its lead back 2:55 into the third with the eventual game-winner when he brought the puck out from behind net, outwaited Bow and tucked it beneath him as the teams played four-on-four.

Hawryluk scored his second on the power play when Seattle attacked on the penalty kill and a two-on-one developed the other way, with Coulter passing to Hawryluk as the play had slowed down. Hawryluk popped it in from the side of the net to give his team a two-goal cushion.

He then scored again into an empty net to make it 7-4.

“It’s unreal,” said Erkamps, the team’s captain.

“I couldn’t have picked a better group of guys. We had a good group of guys last year and I think that paved the way for this year. The guys that we brought in did an amazing job. Guys stepped up tonight (Hawryluk had an unbelievable night).”

Papirny made 27 saves for Brandon, with Bow stopping 32 shots for Seattle.

On the power play, Brandon was 2-for4, while Seattle went 1-for-5.

“There’s no words, honestly,” Hawryluk said.

“This team, we’ve been through so much together and we’ve come a long way. We never quit. We never once thought we couldn’t do this.”

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